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NEWS June 23 2001
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| Exxon Mobil on torture charges The world’s largest oil company, Exxon Mobil, is to face charges of complicity in human rights abuses in Aceh province, Indonesia. The US-based International Labor Rights Fund (ILRF) is bringing the charges in Washington on behalf of 11 Acehnese villagers, holding Exxon Mobil accountable for torture, murder, imprisonment and sexual abuse by members of the Indonesian army unit assigned to protect Exxon’s operations. It is also alleged that Exxon paid for the construction of barracks which were used by the notorious Kopassus (special forces) units for interrogation and torture of local civilians suspected of involvement in separatist activities, and provided the military with heavy equipment for digging mass graves. Kopassus are best known for their part in the genocide in East Timor and ongoing repression in West Papua (Irian Jaya) – it is inconceivable that Mobil staff did not know of Kopassus reputation or at least implicitly condone the abuses taking place around their installations. Several thousand people are estimated to have been killed in the area by Indonesian troops, while many thousands more have been injured, tortured, imprisoned or displaced from their homes during the fighting, which continues despite a series of ceasefires. The current government of Abdurrachman Wahid has ruled out independence for the province. The company has been operating in Aceh, which has some of Indonesia’s largest oil and gas deposits, since the 1970s (as Mobil until the merger in 1999). According to the ILRF’s indictment, Mobil paid large bribes to get the contract initially and in return received military protection against the Free Aceh Movement guerrillas fighting for independence for the province. Local human rights campaigners have accused Mobil of pursuing an ‘enclave development’ approach, in which work was done mainly by outsiders in secure compunds and hardly any benefit reached the local communities. Given this policy, along with Mobil’s involvement with Suharto, and the fact that almost all the revenue from oil extracted in Aceh was going to the government or out of the country, the company became a target for the guerrillas, being perceived as complicit in their oppression. The ongoing attacks on oil and gas installations and staff, including threats and kidnappings, led Exxon Mobil to temporarily close its operations in March this year. The ILRF case is being brought under the US Alien Tort Claims Act, which permits foreigners to bring prosecutions for crimes committed outside the US if they have no legal remedy elsewhere. The law was originally formulated to deal with piracy, but in recent years has been used by human rights organisations to bring cases against corporations accused of human rights abuses in the South. |